This invention relates to a fluorescence detection type electrophoresis apparatus. More particularly, it relates to a fluorescence detection type electrophoresis apparatus suitable to separate and detect DNA, RNA, or protein labeled by fluorophore.
A conventional technique used for determining a DNA base sequence was autoradiography. A more simple optical detection technique has been recently used with fluorescence label (as disclosed for example in "Nature", vol. 321, pp 674-679 (1986); "Bio/Technology", vol. 6, pp 816-821 (1988); and, U.S. Pat. No. 4,832.815. With this method, fluorescence-labeled DNA fragments are migrated in slab gels of about 20 by 40 cm each. A laser beam is thrown on the downstream at a certain distance around 20 cm from the start of migration. A detector is placed around right angles to the migration direction, that is, in front of the slab gels, to receive the fluorescent light from the fluorescence-labeled DNA fragments passing through the slab gels. The length of the DNA fragment can be known in terms of the migration time of the DNA fragment to determine the DNA base sequence.
An apparatus realized in the conventional technique mentioned above needs one measuring instrument for one electrophoretic plate, so that the single measuring instrument cannot obtain information from a plurality of electrophoretic plates. The technique is inappropriate in that a number of apparatuses are needed to measure many samples. The technique also is inappropriate for measuring many samples simultaneously since it is limited by the number of migration lanes to be kept on the single electrophoretic plate.